Monster
by brumania
Summary: The reasons Romania shouldn't be left alone with a mirror. Or with his own thoughts because no one who is slipping should stay in solitude for long periods of time. Slight RomNor at the end very, very slight. Oneshot


The shattering of glass didn't even cause him to stir.

Romania looks down at the fragments of broken glass. They're sprinkled across the old wooden floor, decorating it in a sense. It's like crystal candy, except transparent and flavorless, which would then make it awfully dreary and not candy at all. It needed taste, it needed color. Something vibrant, alive, blatant.

Hm, blood would be nice. The color always stood out the most to him, despite how familiar it is after all these years. The sight of it reminded his tongue of cherries and he would wrap his tongue around the imaginary fruit, feeling it and not feeling it at the same time. It's a strange sensation, and he'd often times question whether it was some kind of synesthesia or not. Chances are that it isn't, since glass and several other things will always stay tasteless to him. A shame, because then he would've had a legitimate reasons for the odd sensations for once.

He looks up to the broken mirror and then remembers once again the reason for all this shattered glass. Looking at the broken refection Romania cringes. He's a mess. It wasn't the bags under his eyes or the messy hair which he paid any attention to, but rather how the pale skin seemed to accentuate all the scars, almost making them appear pink.

All nations have their fair share of scars, even the younger ones wear a handful which were their pride, along with some which bring about shameful memories. But Romania's was a bit of a special case. There were quite a few on his shoulders and stomach, and even one by the base of his neck (a very close situation indeed) but as you got closer and closer to his chest and to where is heart is, they seem to almost multiply. It's like an epicenter of an earthquake and the ugly, rough lines of skin are the fissures and disturbances in the earth.

The sad thing is that many of those chest scars were from his people.

…The saddest thing is that there are a few that came from himself.

Romania's hand moves towards all those scars, ready to claw at it but he stops. No. Not now, at least. It'll bleed for too long and he'd be caught easily. And then would come the questioning. Oh, what could have happened to the poor Romanian? Had someone tried to attack him? Was it an accident? Surely it couldn't be on purpose, because nobody in their right mind would do that (but he's never been in "the right mind" so why should one be so confident?)

Romania knows how to live with others hating him, it'd be impossible to cope with this damned long life if he didn't. Pain isn't new, it's like an old colleague that keeps returning despite the fact that he doesn't want to deal with it, but copes with anyway since there's no other option. Go at war with other nations, other peoples, those things are just something that he does when needed.

The true stinging in his heart occurs when his own people go after him, try to hunt him down and exorcize him, dump holy water on him in the hopes that he'll just melt away, pull his teeth out, tie him down and try to stake him. They had hated him, his people. They had covered their children's eyes when he passed by and told stories in the night as a method of disciplining. They had made signs of the holy cross when walking by, and for so long the only ones who had looked at him in the eyes were the ones who knew he was their nation, but there were only so many who weren't ignorant. Even then, chances were that some of those aware ones had wondered if their people were cursed for having a freak for a nation.

When your people, the whole purpose of your life, hate you, when they try to kill you and think you're a vampire, a monster, well… you start to think that too. Even now, over a century since the last staking attempt, Romania sees a monster through the shattered reflection. The cracks in the mirror separating parts of his face to make it seem less real make it almost easier to cope with.

For now he only feels the rough texture of the scars with his fingers. It disgusts and comforts Romania at the same time, but it only comforts him in that he feels one step closer to death. A morbid thought, he knows. He's full of them. Death is an ever-present theme in a nation's life, and some think about it more than others. Many would say that Romania was on the obsessive side, and it is true, to some extent.

He buttons up a black shirt to cover those scars for now. He isn't supposed to think about this, not now. He can think about it all he wants tomorrow or the day after that. Unfortunately the things that are closest to him, especially his mind and thoughts, are the things that are the most uncontrollable. They spin around as they please; making him the freak show he is today. They make him unstable, flittering between sanity and madness. It's sickening and worrying and entertaining and thrilling at the same time.

Now, that sounds like how a good book feels like, doesn't it? Makes sense, since life really is just an ongoing story, and a nation's just happens to be more like an epic than a novel. What would the themes in Romania's epic be like? Maybe the loss of innocence and the recurring conflicts within mankind? Hm, that would sound like any nation's epic then. It's not unique. Maybe it'll just be about how much of a monster and a freak he is. An analysis on that could fill up volumes of books, he's sure of it. Psychology students would read it for entertainment as one of those unique case studies that they'll never get to work with. If Romania was just human, it would be the best way for him to get immortalized.

Perhaps he should write books about it, see what others think of his mind. To see if there's anything close to the random, inescapable thoughts on death and torture he gets, the flavors he experiences from seeing certain things and only those certain things, the daydreams that behave like nightmares, the spontaneous urges to rage. His people know there's something wrong about him; all the other nations know there's something off with the Romanian. They put him in the_ "Careful, clearly unstable"_ list with Russia and Belarus. But they also underestimate him at the same time and they put him at the lowest spot on that list (except for a few like Hungary,) because nobody knows how truly messed up he is. Like right now he just wants to grab the knife in his drawer and peel his skin with it out of pure hatred and oh the colors would fit nicely with the glass shards on the hardwood floor wouldn't it? It'll be photo-worthy and it'll taste like peaches and cherries and haha he can feel the thoughts slipping down the drain into the gutters to rot and-

The thoughts stop. Romania blinks and snaps back into reality because he hears the doorbell ring. It's like the wakeup call after a nightmare, a promise of a saving grace. He quickly tries to fix his hair so that it would at least look decent and puts on his characteristic top hat. There could only be one person who had rung that doorbell, and that person was expected. Romania races out of the room, locking the bedroom door and runs down the stairs.

Act normal, Romania, act normal. As if nothing ever happened. Why, it's an awfully lovely day isn't it? It'll certainly get better too now that his expected company had come. He opens the door with a big, toothy smile.

"Norvegia~!"

"I see that you're not fully prepared," Norway says in his usual voice void of amusement, "And you were the one begging for this date, too."

Romania puts on the coat that he had placed hanging on the stairs, "What do you mean I'm not ready? I look perfectly fine," No he doesn't. He never does. The shoes come on next, "Now come on, let's go!"

Norway nods, being escorted to the other's car. Romania kisses him on the cheek but there was no subtle grin. Norway was observant enough to know that something was wrong despite the usual cheerfulness. The bags under the Romanian's eyes, the half-hearted manner that his shirt was buttoned, the odd gleam in his eyes which the Norwegian couldn't explain but it was just _there_. And then there was that small drop of blood that fell from his left foot when he was putting on his shoes. However, Norway refuses to ask anything; it is best not to stir into anyone's personal problems unless they come to him about it, and even then he has to be careful in what he says.

But to be honest, he's scared to know the truth.


End file.
